“Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.” 2 Corinthians 3:17 HCSB

Liberty Of The Christian

“Stand
fast therefore in the liberty with which Christ has made us free, and be not
entangled again with the yoke of bondage.” Galatians 5:1

Though I have
been unable to say very much lately, my research has continued to grow on the
subject of freedom in Christ. I find today’s text to be worth contemplating.

The
following illustration is titled Personal
Liberty of the Christian, by H. W. Beecher:

The doctrine of St. Paul is not that a Christian man has a
right to liberty in conduct, thought, and speech in and of himself, without
regard to external circumstances, interests, organizations, and without
reference to his own condition.

Paul's conception of the rights and liberties of men
stands on the philosophical ground underneath all those things. Rights and
liberties belong to stages or states of condition. The inferior has not the
right of the superior.

A stupid man has not the right of an educated or
intelligent man. He may have the legal rights; but the higher ones, that spring
out of the condition of the soul, must stand on the conditions to which they
belong.

A refined man has rights and joys that an unrefined man
has not and cannot have, because he cannot understand them, does not want them,
could not use them.

Rights increase as the man increases — increases, that is,
not merely in physical stature, or in skill of manual employment or material
strength, but in character.

So, as men work up higher and higher towards the Divine
standard of character, their rights and liberties increase. The direct
influence of Christ is to bring the human mind into its highest elements.

The power of the Divine nature upon the human soul is to
lift it steadily away from animalism or from the flesh — the under-man — up
through the realm of mere material wisdom and accomplishment, in the direction
of soul-power, reason, rectitude — such reason and such rectitude as grow up
under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost.

When love has permeated the whole man, he then has perfect
liberty — liberty of thought, liberty of speech, liberty of conduct. A perfect
Christian is the one and only creature that has absolute liberty unchecked by
law, by institution, by foregoing thoughts of men, by public sentiment.

Because a perfect man is in unison with the Divine soul,
he has the whole liberty of God in himself, according to the measure of his
manhood. But he has liberty to do only what he wants to do, and he wants to do
nothing that is not within the bounds and benefit of a pure and true love.

He becomes a law to himself; that is, he carries in
himself that inspiration of love which is the mother of all good law. He is
higher than any law. His will is with God's will. He thinks what is true; he
does what is benevolent.